As part of this week’s Homecoming festivities, Crookston High School in Minnesota scheduled an event that encouraged “guys [to] dress in their camouflage and other hunting apparel while girls … show off their animal print,” the Grand Forks Herald reports.
Originally dubbed “Prey and Predator Day,” the event was changed to just “Camo Day” after the original description caused a stir among Crookston residents.
"In hindsight and looking at it from a different light, a better decision should have been made," Superintendent Chris Bates said. "People might see it in a different way than it was intended. The change is good."
According to Principal Lon Jorgensen, the school’s students did not realize the name’s underlying connotations, adding, “hunting in this area is pretty popular.”
The town’s residents, including Ileanna Noyes, were not so understanding, however, and were quick to voice concern over the school’s subtle endorsement of sexual assault.
Noyes described the decision as “absurd” and “appalling,” telling the Grand Forks Herald, “Really, in this day and age, you think it's OK to have the mentality of the men as predators and the women as pretty prey?”
In June, Stuyvesant High School students in New York participated in “Slutty Wednesday” -- albeit not as part of any school-sponsored themed dress-up day. Rather, students of the elite New York City public school were protesting its new dress code, which -- among other things -- banned the exposure of midriffs, visible underwear, shoulders and lower backs.
A letter sent home with students at Western Union Elementary School in North Carolina didn't sit well with parents this March. The note asked students to wear "African American attire" or animal print for a Black History Month event, calling into question educators' choice of words and cultural sensitivity.
In a statement, school officials said the letter was "well intended" but "poorly worded."